Videos
by Blanche Mottershead
Summary: With Cosima's illness getting worse she starts to obsessively watch project LEDA's videos of the dead patient. Delphine goes to comfort her. please read and review :)


The Videos

She could hear them before she saw them. She could hear Jennifer's voice, cracked, hopeless, devoid of any further fight for life, as it had been the last time Delphine had seen her. Sure enough, when she walked into the little living room of the apartment she now shared with Cosima, she saw her face staring out of the television, pale and waxen and exhausted. She looked tired of the world. Tired of living, of fighting.

"I'm going to die in here."

Delphine sighed as she listened to Jennifer's words and walked briskly over to the antique French sofa where she knew she would find Cosima.

"Cosima I really don't think that you should…" She broke off as she saw her, eyes closed, breathing slowly, and a little too shallowly for comfort, fast asleep. The television remote was perched precariously in her limp hand, her glasses ever so slightly askew. Delphine hated to think how long she might have been lying there, watching these tapes over and over and over. It was a mistake, showing them to her. All it had done was force Cosima to face the increasing severity of her situation, and her own mortality. The only thing she had succeeded in doing was pointing out to her that her body was betraying her. Her own body had joined the army of people that was against her and that were a threat to her, and now she had no one to trust, not even herself. And in forcing her to face this terrifying reality, and the uncertainty of her future, she had frightened her. She would never show it, only rarely, but Delphine could see it in her eyes. There was a hidden fear lurking behind the sparkle in her big brown eyes when she smiled. Of course she had a right to know about them, but telling her would have been enough. The only thing that showing Cosima those videos had accomplished was terror and nightmares, nightmares that stalked her love in her sleep, and made her afraid to go to bed at night. Her fingers would twitch; her face would be scrunched into a permanent frown; her muscles flinched as she murmured in fearful protest.

Delphine sighed heavily and gently eased the remote control from Cosima's slack grip and switched off the TV just as Jennifer went to pull off her headscarf. She sat down dejectedly besides her sleeping girlfriend and let her head flop into her hands. She hated this. She hated every fibre and every particle of it. Just as she had found a love, her sweet sweet love, her beautiful intelligent sweet Cosima, it all seemed to be sliding away from her.

Cosima coughed in her sleep, making Delphine sit up and her head snap round as she looked at her, concern rippling through her body. Every time she coughed the frightened blonde's heart skipped a beat and leapt up into her throat. She very gently brushed her fingertips down the side of her lover's cheek, tracing the contours of her face. Cosima seemed to calm for a moment before coughing again, a little more violently this time.

"Vous êtes bien ma chérie," she mumbled as she gently eased her into her embrace, wrapping her arms protectively and possessively around her, careful not to wake her. "Vous êtes bien."

She simply held her, listening to her shallow breathing that filled the silence, absentmindedly caressing her face.

"Je t'aime," she mumbled, planting a soft kiss on her forehead. "Je t'aime tellement." Cosima let out a little sigh and a smile stretched across her face.

"I love it when you do that," she mumbled sleepily, not opening her eyes.

"What?"

"Talk to me in French. I love that sound." She placed one hand on Delphine's chest and nestled a little closer, so that her head was over the other woman's heart. "Just as I love that sound."

"I am sorry if I woke you. If you are tired you should sleep. I can go if…" But as she said this Cosima's fingers clenched around Delphine's top, and she looked up at her solemnly, fear glittering behind her big dark eyes, her bottom lip beginning to tremble.

"Please don't." Delphine wrapped her arms more tightly around the other woman's small frame as tears began to spill from Cosima's eyes. She was shocked by this momentary lapse in strength. It frightened her to see Cosima, who was always so strong, so fearless, now so frightened.

"Oh chérie! Je vais vous proteger." She kissed her and held her close as she cried, as if attempting to cocoon her. "I will protect you Cosima. We will find a cure. I promise. Je promets."


End file.
